If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first. The world would love you as one of its own if you belonged to it, but you are no longer part of the world. I chose you to come out of the world, so it hates you. Do you remember what I told you? 'A slave is not greater than the master.' Since they persecuted me, naturally they will persecute you. And if they had listened to me, they would listen to you. They will do all this to you because of me, for they have rejected the one who sent me. They would not be guilty if I had not come and spoken to them. But now they have no excuse for their sin. Anyone who hates me also hates my Father. If I hadn't done such miraculous signs among them that no one else could do, they would not be guilty. But as it is, they have seen everything I did, yet they still hate me and my Father. This fulfills what is written in their Scriptures: 'They hated me without cause.'
Milledgeville georgia. This area is a powder keg waiting to go off from what I can tell. I instincts might be wrong, very tired, maybe a bit paranoid, but I don't think so, the indications keep on coming.
Really weird encounters. I'm in a huge Lowe's parking lot, as many times before across the country, working on the vehicle. They didn't announce their title but two employees came out and I'm guessing they were manager and assistant manager, not rude, but on edge. They came out expecting to tell me to leave I'm quite sure. When they caught a glimpse of me in my attire with tools in my hand, it seems that they thought better of it. There were a few nervous words from them. And then they left.
There have been a few pastors by and unlike almost everywhere else in the country where there is a energetic interest, it's more like they're checking out the stranger, there's a tenseness. A defensiveness.
I don't recall ever in my life being in a place where I was hated aside from standing Rock, and they're in the midst of so many gentle souls there was a big buffer between that and the snipers up on the hill.
Here it's much more tangible. The plan is to fuel up at a spectacular small Asian buffet where I ate yesterday. Medicine I consider it.
To kill time there and maybe in a tractor supply parking lot until later in the evening, returning to the huge Walmart parking lot that's terribly noisy at night, hoping for no trouble, we really need some rest and a sabbath, and then continuing on in a relatively short day beginning mid-morning tomorrow.
Jesus said, Blessed are you when men hate you, And when they exclude you, And revile you, and cast out your name as evil, For the Son of Man's sake. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy! For indeed your reward is great in heaven, For in like manner their fathers did to the prophets.
I'd be a liar if I didn't say that I understand myself as the nature of disciple, the nature of prophet.
In the log yesterday I mentioned my new realization that it is as though creator, jesus, are constantly managing experiences for me so that I grow and become a more capable example of what a human being is born to be. It certainly takes some adjusting. And learning. No regrets.
Very important reminder to not get attached to being alive, to being out of jail, to being out of prison, do not being roadkill. Seriously. Those aren't life, they're distractions from life. Being the best possible human being that we can be, growing, moment to moment, that's life. No, that is not the real world. Jesus called us out of the real world, not to ignore it, not to deny it, but to stop being slave to it, and instead to be a joyful dutiful servant of creator, of jesus. Welcome reminder.
Actual photograph of disciple James at the moment.
At least one time Jesus embraced being a sacrificial lamb. To embrace the service of allowing oneself to be crucified. For the benefit to the world of it convicting itself, and thereby creating a learning opportunity. Time for me to dust off those skills.
Among the skills Jesus perfected and exemplified was making of himself as perfect sacrifice. Persisting until the end. James would like to be able to do that. Maybe he can.
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